America Holding Walmart’s Feet to the Fire

Monday, December 3, 2012

Finally, someone is holding Walmart directly accountable for the abuse of workers in its contracted warehouses. "Recent discovery has established that Walmart bears ultimate responsibility for the violations of state and federal law committed against plaintiff warehouse workers," said a court document filed in Los Angeles.

“Wal-Mart employs a network of contractors and subcontractors who have habitually broken the law to keep their labor costs low and profit margins high. We believe Wal-Mart knows exactly what is happening and is ultimately responsible for stealing millions of dollars from the low-wage warehouse workers who move Wal-Mart merchandise."

Corporate Welfare: instead of taking a small partition of their record profits, or slightly cutting CEO pay to help out their workers, Walmart wants YOU, the taxpayer, to pay for its workers’ healthcare. Just one more reason Walmart workers, and the population at large, are standing up to Walmart.

Walmart wants you to think its workers love the store and love their jobs. If that’s the case, why are there unprecedented protests against the mega retailer spanning the country? Why is the store facing a lawsuit from contracted warehouse workers? Since Walmart has given us no real evidence that its workers love the store, maybe we are just supposed to take Walmart’s word for it?

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The great American middle class wasn’t something that just happened – it was built brick by brick. It was built by soldiers returning from war and a government that repaid them by giving them a shot at college.

What the wealthy and well-connected figured out is that they have strength in numbers: the numbers of dollars they contribute to politicians. It’s time working and middle class Americans use our strength in numbers to reclaim the American Dream. We need a counterweight to the power of big money – and that’s the power of big numbers, the power of ordinary people who work for a living demanding to have our voices heard – from the workplace to Washington.